Editor's Note: This article was excerpted from Kristine Steakley's new book Child of Divorce, Child of God (InterVarsity Press, 2008).  

While I was growing up, I adored my father. Perhaps it was easy to do so since I only saw him for a few weeks each year. But there really was a lot to adore. My father is handsome and charming and witty. He likes to have goofy fun, he has an artistic flair and long ago he acquired an urban sophistication. When I was little, he would take pictures of me from all different angles like I was a model posing for Vogue, then hand over the camera and ham it up while I snapped a few shots of him. He bought me my first tape recorder and encouraged me to record my thoughts and conduct interviews. He was my first interview subject, and I still giggle when I listen to the tape and hear his purposefully silly answers to my very serious questions.

By the time I was a teenager, I knew Dad was not perfect. For one thing, he was a procrastinator and was often late. I remember once running through LAX desperately trying to get to the gate before boarding closed, while Dad waited for my bags to go through security and then ran after me. (I made it, but just barely.) And he was not the most practical guy. One fun day at the beach with him resulted in the two of us lounging in agony in front of fans, our skin the color of just-boiled lobsters because Dad did not bring sunblock and I was too young to think of it myself.

Still, if ever a girl thought her father walked on clouds, it was me. And then he disappeared in the clouds, and I didn’t see him for eight long years. When I did finally see him again, he tried to get me to call him Bill instead of Dad. I remember the first few times I saw him after those eight years, when the walls that had been erected were slowly being dismantled. There were some awkward moments, some tentative conversations. Something in our relationship was broken, shattered, and while we were picking up the pieces and slowly applying glue, there were still a lot of jagged edges and missing parts.  

As we began rebuilding our father-daughter relationship, I found myself always wanting more. Every interaction I had with Dad left me disappointed. It was like getting a small sip of water when what I really wanted was to gulp down a full bottle to slake my thirst. Then I read Dr. Kevin Leman’s book Making Sense of the Men in Your Life, and I realized that I was carrying around an expectation of my dad that he was not meeting. I wanted him to be Father of the Year, to suddenly turn into Pa Ingalls or Ward Cleaver.  

The pastor of a church I once attended was fond of saying, “The difference between reality and expectation is disappointment.” He was right. Leman put it this way: “You know that latent sense that you’ve always been missing something but you were never sure exactly what it was? Well, this is it. This is the father you’ve always wanted, pitted against the father you’ve always had.”1

Reading those words was a breakthrough for me. I realized that my dad had never been the superstar I had made him out to be. He was not the creature from the black lagoon, but neither was he Ward Cleaver. I needed to stop holding my dad responsible for not being the father I wanted him to be and start appreciating and enjoying the father he is.

My dad is probably never going to engage me in deep conversations about my life, give me fatherly advice about men and ask how my car is running. But he is still a charming and witty man who makes me laugh and encourages my talents.